The junior varsity boys placed first at a meet hosted by Cascade Thursday evening.
The boys junior varsity was against the only complete Sweet Home cross country team.
“We just have a lot of inexperience and young kids,” Coach Wayne Spinney said, so rather than run them all on varsity, they’ve been running JV.
As a team, the boys scored 48 points and had their first six runners in the top 15 of 106 competitors.
Chris Burford led the team at 10:39 placing third.
Behind him, Coach Spinney said, there were several points where the team knew it was contending for the top spot, and the boys ran a tight race.
Robert McGarry was next in at eighth place, 10:54. Chris Lovely was 10th, 10:58; Keegan Burnett, 12th, 11:05; Aaron Lovik, 14th, 11:09; and Robert Couch, 15th, 11:20. All of the runners set PRs.
You couldn’t ask for a better bunch,” Coach Spinney said of how tightly the group finished.
Running seventh on the team was Sam Crain at 16:19. Crain improved, setting a PR by three minutes, finishing 103rd.
On varsity, John Lovik finished third at 17:20 setting a 1:44 PR for the course.
“He beat some people that have beaten him soundly,” Coach Spinney said.
Richard Westvik was the only other varsity runner, finishing 59th at 20:09.
Three girls ran on junior varsity.
The course runs through a grove of Christmas trees, Coach Spinney said. At one point, the course turns to the right. Some of the girls were unfamiliar with the course. The race leaders turned left. Anne Helfrich, running close to the front, followed them. Those girls added a half mile to their race stretching their times out.
Helfrich finished 15:17 in 38th place, Coach Spinney said. Had she run the right direction, she probably would have finished at about 13 minutes, making her third place on the race.
Megan Snow finished at 12th for the Huskies at 13:57. Andrea Martin finished 19th at 14:24.
“I think they have some maturing to do,” Coach Spinney said of the team overall. “There’s a clear separation between our top runner and the pack, but the more I think about it, if we have a group of people willing to work hard over the next month, we could surprise some people at the district meet.”
On Monday last week, the Huskies hosted the annual Class Invitational with Capital Conference schools.
Freshman Boys: Chris Lovely, second, 12:12; and Sam Crain, 13th, 19:24.
Sophomore Boys: John Lovik, first, 10:17; and Aaron Lovik, 13th, 12:58.
Sophomore Girls: Megan Snow, fifth, 15:18; and Andrea Martin, seventh, 15:47.
Junior Boys: Richard Westvik, sixth, 12:00; and Robert McGarry, 14th, 12:53.
Saturday, the team competes in the South Salem Invitational at Bush Park, a preview of the district course.